1. Technical Field
This invention relates to methods for neutralizing vesicant agents and related chemical compounds.
More specifically, this invention relates to methods for neutralizing chemical agents, including G and V Class nerve agents, (and their binary components DF and QL) and especially such specific agents as lewisite, the mustard agents, and mixtures of lewisite and mustards, (and the arsenicals DA, DC and DM) to obtain a reaction product that may be transported and disposed of as a hazardous waste rather than as a chemical weapon.
2. Description of Related Art
Stocks of toxic chemical weapons left over from previous military conflicts exist here in the United States and at various other locations around the world. Those stocks include in particular large quantities of blister agents such as lewisite and the mustard agents. There are ongoing programs to dispose of those materials by means of incineration or by chemical destruction.
A number of techniques have been developed for the decontamination of materials and personnel that have been exposed to chemical agents. Those techniques include the use of a solvent, such as acetone, to wash the agent from the contaminated objects and the use of certain chemicals or mixtures of chemicals to react with and destroy the contaminant chemical agent. Examples of decontaminating chemicals that have been used in the past include calcium hypochlorite, chlorinated lime, hydrogen peroxide, and other oxidizing reagents. It is also common to use mixtures of chemicals as decontaminating agents, for example, mixtures of diethylenetriamine, sodium hydroxide and ethylene glycol monomethyl ether.
A method to detoxify the nerve agent VX and other phosphonothiolates as well as phosphonothioic acids is described in a recent patent to Yang et al, U.S. Pat. No. 5,710,358. A peroxymonopersulfate such as potassium peroxymonpersulfate, suitably a commercially available form of that compound that is sold under the trademark Oxone®, is reacted with the agent to oxidize it and convert it into less toxic products.
It is also known in the literature that lewisite and mustard agents can be neutralized or destroyed through reaction with a number of different reactant chemicals. Those reactant chemicals include amino-alcohols, persulfates, peroxy-acids, peroxides, halogenated hydantoins, and hypochlorites. Each known reactant chemical system presents a different set of advantages and disadvantages, and none provides a reasonably satisfactory method for the destruction and disposal of those toxic agents. In fact, some reactant chemicals produce products that are themselves so toxic as to require disposal as a chemical agent. This invention provides a process that alleviates and overcomes the problems and deficiencies inherent in the known prior art practices, and so constitutes a significant advance in the art.